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Richard Coupe: Today we’re going to talk about the National Water-Quality Assessment
program and part of a component of that is our Agricultural Chemical Transport study.
This is a study looking at the affects of agriculture on water quality at seven different
sites across the country. And today specifically though we’re going to being talking about
an area in Northwest Mississippi, our Mississippi Alluvial Plain commonly referred to as the
Delta. And we’re going to talk to some farmers, were going to talk to some scientists and
we’re going to take a little bit of a tour of the Delta. So Jeannie tell us a little
bit about what you’ve been doing for the agricultural chemical transport study.
Jeanne: So I’ve been working on the role of groundwater / surface water exchange on
the transport of agricultural chemicals in the Bogue Phalia Basin.
Richard Coupe: And why is this important to study?
Jeanne: Well actually, at first we thought it wasn’t important to study. We’ve sampled
the groundwater in the Delta extensively and have never found much if any agricultural
chemicals in the groundwater. And so the assumption was that there was very little interaction
between the surface water and the groundwater since the surface water always had agricultural
chemicals in it of some form. But what we found is that actually, it’s not the hydrology
that’s preventing the exchange of groundwater/surface water, it’s the chemistry of our groundwater
system. And so for example in our study area we found that we actually were in connection
with the aquifer and we were generally gaining and losing some movement of water both ways
but it was the chemistry within the streambed and the aquifer that was actually causing
nitrogen for this example to be reduced to in two.
Richard Coupe: And so what are the major conclusions that you’ve found from this study?
Jeanne: We find that we have huge swings in both the direction of the movement of water
between the groundwater and surface water and that this has a fairly large impact on
the chemistry of surface water. It could have impact on what we’re planting in the ground.
Richard Coupe: Okay, thanks.
Jeanne: Thank you.
[End of Audio]
Duration: 3 minutes
1 Jeanne interview- GW-SW Interaction 3:01
Richard Coupe, Jeanne Barlow
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